


After Midgar

by AddisonJPorter



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-01
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-21 10:37:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9544187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AddisonJPorter/pseuds/AddisonJPorter
Summary: Black rain falls on the rebuilt slums of Sector 7 in Midgar. In the neon-lit 7th Heaven, one mistake by Tifa ruins her new life, marriage, and sets her in motion for a wholly new kind of adventure.Meanwhile, at the Shinra Building, an old enemy stirs.





	1. OLD TIMES

The rain thundered down in the pitch black drops that only the Midgar sky could create. The storm had been shouting down at the city all through the night – with the darkness and the dish above the Sector 7 slums, and the black water dripping through the cracks, the night raged at the inhabitants of Midgar.

Cloud Strife looked out of the upper window of 7th Heaven, the rebuilt bar that once served as Avalanche's base of operations. He looked at the ramshackle craftsmanship that was somehow holding the city together. When Shinra had dropped the plate above they thought Sector 7 would be gone for good, but slums don't take that long to rebuild. Most of the survivors were thankful for the increased amount of material lying around they could prop up their houses with to keep out the rain.

A putrid hissing vent brought Cloud out of his daydream. Across the way was a huge billboard, a recruitment poster, for the new iteration of SOLDIER. Three big muscle-men in power armour, gunsights aimed into the distance. Cloud shook his head, and even managed a wry grimace at the image. That's not what a soldier looks like, he thought to himself, looking in the mirror at his own shirtless body. Thin, lank, wiry, but hardened after years of bruising and breaking. All the soldiers he had ever known had been the same. His blonde hair, once a vibrant yellow, was showing the first signs of fading. He looked back out, longingly at the poster. Part of him wanted to be back in the combat, and part of him just wished he looked like the soldiers on the poster.

After he got dressed he lumbered down the stairs into the bar. 7th Heaven had been rebuilt almost entirely out of the rubble of the old bar, with road signs added to cover the new cracks. On every wall, somewhere, was a speed limit sign hiding amongst the woodwork. Some new kid was serving drinks while Barrett, his old companion, was in the corner, shooting whisky and polishing his gun arm. From the elbow down on his right arm Barrett was all machine. He didn't have much call to fire it these days but he kept the gun attachment ready all the same. Things could turn quickly, as all inhabitants of Midgar knew too well.

The bar was an affront of neon, grime, and coffee rings. Cloud sat on his own at a table a few seats away from Barrett, who greeted him with a nod and a grunt, then Cloud bent down to unplug the cables of the nearest lights, to give his eyes some rest. In a sector of permanent artificial light, you had to snatch the natural darkness where you could find it. His eyes adjusted and he breathed out in relief. Then the door opened.

She was the soul of every room. You meet people in the span of your life, maybe less than a handful, who just perk up every joint they walk into. Tifa was one of those people. She ran 7th Heaven and she ran it well. The punters loved her – she was gorgeous, it was hard not to love her - but she didn't suffer fools. 7th Heaven wasn't some mudhole for the scum of the city, it was a place of refuge, calm, and alcohol. Hell, some people even brought their kids in there. Barrett's daughter, Marlene, was by Tifa's side and she came bounding in to see her father. Tifa dropped some bags on the table in front of him. She was tall – much taller than Barrett – and had hair now long enough to almost reach her knees.

“Hey,” Tifa kissed Barrett on the cheek, and her engagement ring glittered in the neon. Cloud, without making an excuse, stood from his table and left.

“He been alright today?” asked Tifa, as Cloud disappeared behind a closing door.

Barrett, with Marlene on one knee, finished the last drops of his bottle of whiskey. “Same as everyday.” He whispered something in his daughter's ear, and she ran off to her room. “You need to talk to him, woman. We all know what's going on. If he's going to stay here he has to accept that you and I are together now.”

“He does accept it, he just-”

“Why can't he stay in the room when you and I are both here?”

Tifa had no answer. She combed her fingers through her hair to distract from the tear in the corner of her eye.

“That's what I thought. Christ. As if things weren't hard enough for us right now. Tonight, Tifa. He has to go. You have to tell him.”

She sat down at his table and took his hand in hers. “He knows you're the one for me, Barrett. He isn't hanging around waiting for an opportunity. I know that's what's really on your mind. Think I can't smell the jealousy on you? Think I can't work out why our whisky supply has been going down so quick?” She said it with a smile, but she was telling the truth. Barrett stared back with an unmoved face, contemplating the situation. 

“Tonight,” he said. “He goes or I go.”

“Then he goes.”

He wrapped his fingers around hers and brought her hand to his lips to kiss it. “I'll shoot off for the night. Go check on some old friends. I want him gone but he doesn't need me here to embarrass him. We've been through enough.” He paused for a second. “If you can, try and be gentle.”

Barret let go of her hand, called for Marlene, and wrapped around him the biggest, thickest coat he could find. “This rain has to stop soon, right? What was the point in all we did, all Avalanche did, if the pollution is still this bad?”

Tifa smiled, and threw the empty whisky bottle from the table into the bin in the corner. “That can be task number two. Maybe there's still a role for Avalanche to play in Midgar.”

Barrett grunted, his eyes softening for a second as he waved goodbye at the door, then he walked out with Marlene linking her arm in his.

Tifa rapped her knuckles on the table, building herself up for the talk. It was going to be a big one. Things had been brewing for a while. They had taken Cloud in, of course they had, he was their friend, but when Cloud had seen that engagement ring for the first time...

She shook herself out of it. How dare he feel like the injured party? She had been there after that final battle, ready for him. But he was the one who took off without a parting word, what was she meant to do? Wait for him? When Barrett was just there, loving, and vibrant. This was just how things had happened, and Cloud would have to get used to it.

She knocked on his door firmly, rehearsing in her head what she needed to say. His voice from within let her know she could enter. She swung the door open and marched in, he sat on the foot of his bed.

“Before you begin-” he started.

“This isn't your time to talk,” Tifa interrupted, arms folded over her chest. “Cloud, Barrett and I love you. You know that. We were happy to take you in. But Barrett isn't a fool, and certainly I'm not one either. I hoped you might eventually move past it all and be happy for me and him, but you're just getting worse.” Her arms still folded, she gripped her arms. “Barrett knows. Of course he knows. He's been aware of how you feel ever since you came back. He's been so patient with you, but you've done nothing to repay him for that. It's time for you to go.”

Cloud, not even nodding to show he had been listening, rolled his eyes to the ceiling.

“Well?” said Tifa.

“Well what?”

“What do you have to say?”

He rolled his eyes back at her, sterner than he was with her usually. “If you want me gone, then I'm gone.”

He got off the bed and grabbed his boots from the shelf. Tifa watched him lace them both on. He had his back to her, and grabbed his coat. 

“Thank you, Cloud. And for what it's worth-”

She didn't get any further. She couldn't. Cloud, in a second, was across the room and standing in front of her. The top of his chest at head height. She could see the rise and fall of his breath. “Cloud,” was all she could manage to say.

“I can't leave here like this.”

She looked up into his eyes, begging him to say something more. But that was all he had. His hands were on her shoulders, and he was leaning in. She felt herself envelop his body in hers, when the thought of Barrett and little Marlene came into her mind. She pushed Cloud back and he toppled onto the bed.

Cloud, never a master of human interaction, misread the signs. Propping himself up with an elbow, he used his other hand to undo his belt.

Tifa stood over him, weighing up her options. Her resolve was tested when she saw, from the outline getting steadily more defined under his clothes, that Cloud was ready for her.

But it didn't change anything. You still have Barrett, she told herself, and she looked away. But hungrily she turned back to the man on the bed, who had eyes hungrier than hers. Maybe, she thought and reasoned, that we need this to say goodbye. For him to say goodbye. One final act between two souls who narrowly missed one another, then we can go our own way. 

With that justification she allowed herself to watch him undress. Cloud wasn't a natural seducer, so his method of removing his clothes was entirely pragmatic, rather than sultry. She had to giggle, which made him jump, scared that he was doing something wrong. This was her last opportunity to tell him no, to back out.

With a smile and a wave of her hand, she made him continue.

She knelt at the foot of the bed and dragged Cloud by the calf down to her. On two knees she loomed between his legs, and at last, with one hand, grabbed him.

He shuddered. She could feel relief flowing through him, along with something a lot more potent than mere relief. With him in her hand she began stroking, and pulling. 

He moaned a little, and made a grab at her chest. She slapped him away with her free hand. This was her moment. She was in control. She now took him with two hands, sliding back and forth, and massaging him. She panted as she felt him get harder and harder – and bigger. She could feel every vein pulsing with excitement and she saw his hands grip the bedsheets.

It's just a goodbye, she thought. That's all this is. A goodbye.

His eyes pleaded at her and, without him needing to say a word, she knew what he wanted. She leant forward and rolled out her tongue. He had his eyes closed with anticipation. Tifa slid her tongue slowly up his length, before lapping at the tip. Cloud was in wonderful agony. She could see in his face how much this was giving him. With a breath, Tifa wrapped her lips around the head, and then pushed it in.

It was hard, and he was so excited he was thrusting a little. She took it in as far as it would go, and, when she had her throat full, she looked up at him dead in the eye. He had his hands on her head, stroking her affectionately with one hand, while with the other pulling her further in, trying to be as deep inside her possible.

She released him and came up for air, her saliva dripping a bridge between her lips and his dick. She went back for more and deeply massaged him with her tongue while she had him in her mouth. This is only for him, a duty, she thought, that's all it is.

But that wasn't true. Her right hand betrayed her real feelings and it found it's way down through her skirt. With Cloud deeper in her mouth than ever, she brushed her index finger against her clitoris. She was so excited it was all she needed. She started playing with it more forcefully, and soon she was shuddering uncontrollably, barely able to keep Cloud between her lips. She felt the first explosive release of her own orgasm and Cloud, seeing how much she was enjoying him, responded in kind. He fountained into the air in a hot burst. Most of it fell back down along the side of his penis.

The black rain continued to thud against the window.

Tifa stroked herself for a little longer, while holding Cloud with her other hand, savouring every last moment. Then she stood up off the floor, bent over Cloud, and sucked him dry, cleaning him with her tongue. Cloud, sweaty, exhausted, but thrilled, launched himself off his back to kneel upright, facing her. He grabbed the small of her back and pulled him into her and kissed her hard. It was the messy, uncomfortable, kiss of insatiable desire. Tifa didn't pull away.

He fell back onto the bed, with his arms behind his head. He smiled an exhausted smile, then looked back across the room to beckon Tifa to lie with him. She had already left.

#

The morning after, Cloud woke up alone. After a few moments the memories crept back to his mind, and he smiled at the thought of the night before. Then he dropped the smile, thinking of what had to be done now. Things that still needed to be said. What he needed to say to Tifa, and the apology he needed to give to Barrett.

He strolled downstairs into the bar, completely empty at this time of day except for Barrett, hand flat on the bar, looking down. Cloud sat at a stool at the bar, while Barrett slid an opened envelope to him.

“It's addressed to you,” said Barrett, not meeting his eye.

Cloud picked it up. “But it's already been opened.”

“Anything in my bar gets opened by me.”

Cloud skimmed the note. 

To Cloud,  
I've let everyone down with one terrible mistake. What happened between us stays in Midgar, a city I have no intention of ever returning to. I hope you find happiness.  
Tifa

He put the note face down on the table.

“She addressed one to me,” said Barrett. “I know what happened.”

“This isn't how it should have gone.”

“There's nothing to say.” Barrett left the bar, grabbed his coat, and went to the door. “Me and Marlene are leaving. I'm going to find Tifa.” He raised his machine-gun arm to a lock on Cloud's head. “If I ever see you again, by intent or by accident, I will kill you.”

He left out of the front door, into the rain that still hadn't stopped. Cloud sat alone in the bar.


	2. ABOVE THE CLOUDS

The Highwind chugged through the sky, managing, somehow, both to elegantly soar and make the noise of a bucket of bolts falling down a set of stairs. Midgar was soon a speck on the horizon. Tifa, sighing as she looked at the departing city, turned back to her cabin.

Cid, the captain of the ship and an old friend, had been only too happy to pick her up outside Midgar. Said he was happy for the company, when she radioed him for a lift. She didn't explain her situation but he knew well enough that she needed some space. He chomped on his cigarette when she boarded, gave a meaningful wink, and lead her to her room. Then he lowered his goggles to his eyes and got back at the controls. She had spent most of the journey on deck, enjoying a sky that wasn't full of black rain.

It was in her cabin, sitting down finally on the camp bed, that the guilt of her actions came to her. Things had been so good for so long. What would Marlene think? Was she old enough for Barrett even to explain why they were now apart?

Tifa had already decided what she wanted to do. She would ask Cid to take her to Nibelheim. It was her hometown, but she hadn't been there in so long it would offer her something new. A new life, she thought, just what I need. There will be new loves there, new friends. Just as she she started to feel the guilt of thinking so little of Barrett, a fresh wave of the emotion hit her when she realised how much she was thinking about someone else.

Cloud Strife. She laid down and laughed, her face in her hands. That man was a joke. An emotionless, joyless, husk of a man who seemed to enter her life once every few years, with metronome-like reliability, just to ruin everything. Why had she done it. She thought this with some regret, but also thought with yet more regret: why didn't we go further.

It was silly to actually think it, because what they had done was pretty serious. But try as she might, she couldn't get the thought out of her head. The thought of what it would have felt like to go just that one tiny step further, to press the weight of her hips down on his, and to feel him enter her. Her hands began to travel absent-mindedly down the length of her body. After so much guilt, she now felt only anguish at what else she could have done. She had thrown everything away in the first moment, why hadn't she pushed things further?

The scene was now playing out in her day-dream. She imagined herself taking more control, and then he would fight back, flip her over, and pin her arms to the bed. Her fingers stirred beneath her underwear. Then he would have spread her thighs apart with his knees, making room before he slid himself in. She curled her lip, then slipped one finger, followed quickly by a second, into her longing vagina.

With rigid fingers she did her best to replicate what she thought it would have felt like, but it wasn't enough. She felt almost desperate with the sensation, she needed to feel as close as possible to what should have been. She looked around her room anxiously for anything that would do – aha! She thought, grabbing a hairbrush. The handle was stout, short, but thick. In a rational moment she would have laughed at the idea but now... She grabbed it by the bristles and plunged the handle between her legs, for a moment perfectly completing the picture she had been trying to imagine.

An hour later, after she had tried her best to calm down, she was back outside on deck. She was leaning over the rails at the back of the ship, letting the wind snap her out of her passionate daydreams. The closest thing to a cold shower, she thought.

“Been a tough day for yer, eh?”

It was Cid. He flicked his stub of a cigarette over the side of the airship and stood behind Tifa. “Call it a sixth sense, but Cid Highwind knows when a woman is feeling down.”

Tifa remained staring out over the edge, not turning around to face her visitor. “It's been a day of a few mistakes,” she said.

“Right. That hairbrush one of them?”

She reddened. Her only verbal response was to gasp. Embarrassment locked her into her position.

“When I said sixth sense,” said Cid, enjoying every word he was saying. “I guess you could take that to mean my security cameras. This is an awful big ship that carries a lot of cargo, I need to know every thing's on lockdown. What a surprise it was to look at a screen and to see a cargo more precious than usual going at it.”

He paused, giving her a chance to chime in. She said nothing. “But not successfully, so it seemed?”

“What do you want Cid?” Tifa screwed her eyes shut, bending over the railing farther and gripping it with her hands, wishing he would leave and let her forget this had ever happened.

“What I want? Hell, lady, it's what you want. I ain't no master of what's going with you, but I can sure tell what you were looking for in there, and what you couldn't get.”

She felt a firm hand grip her from behind.

“Let's see what I can do for you, eh, lady?”

She allowed the moment to pass where she could have told him no. Instead she stayed where she was. His hands lifted her skirt and she felt the tips of his coarse, workman's, fingers touch the edge of her labia.

He grunted to himself. “My, I could stay here and do this all night. But from what I saw you already covered the preamble all by yourself.”

She felt his fingers leave, then grip her on either side of her waist. She didn't even hear the zip before, with a shunt, Cid was fully inside her. Tifa panted and gripped the railing harder for support, arching her back further, pushing her thick round ass around him, taking him deeper, and using her strength with his to keep him swinging in and out.

She only thought of Cloud. With him taking her from behind she couldn't see his face - it could be Cloud doing this to her.

Cid wheezed as he slapped her ass, and she felt him losing pace. She had forgotten how much older he was. The noises he was making as he so quickly ran out of energy turned her stomach, and she couldn't maintain the illusion, with his ghastly, nicotine-soaked gasps, that it was the man she wanted behind her.

“Enough,” she said, pulling him out of her and straightening up. She rested against the railing. Cid stood, a little confused, hanging out of his pants.

“Whatever you say, lady. But you wouldn't leave a man in this position, would you? What would the world be coming to?”

He was still, very much, standing to attention. Tifa sighed and all but rolled her eyes, before taking him with her hand and tugging him forcefully. Joylessly. She watched dispassionately as she worked him into giddy excitement.

Any lack of motivation on her part was certainly not noticed by Cid, who had his hands resting on his back and was ogling her with his eyes. She pulled him firmer, twisting her fingers around his throbbing member. Without warning, he came.

After the eruption she had seen the night before it was a little disappointing. She looked as the few weak jets of semen burst over the edge of the ship. She dropped him from her fingers, with some of his ejaculate caught between her thumb and forefinger. She toyed with it between her fingers, before carelessly licking it off her hands.

“I don't know who pissed you off,” said Cid, shimmying his way back into his trousers. “But I need to buy him a beer.”

He laughed, whistled, and strode away. Tifa remained, still feeling unsatisfied.


	3. A CALAMITY

The Shinra Building was, as far as anyone in Midgar was concerned, a ruin. Tours for Midgar tourists would point to it out the windows of coaches and say, in reverent tones, "that's what the Weapons did."

It was crumbling, it was broken, but it certainly wasn't dead.

Inside the main tower, still thriving amidst the rubble, one floor kept the lights on behind the blacked out windows. 

Rufus sipped from his tea-cup and waved away his manservant, who had been trained to never directly meet his eye or to make an utterance. There was a report on his desk written in code that to a casual observer would have looked like a medical chart with random zigzags. 

“How can she be so insatiable,” said Rufus, mainly to himself, but also for the attention of the professor.

Hojo, with a hacking cough known only to those who have stood on the brink of death multiple times, explained that her wants and needs were impossible to evaluate.

Rufus was the president of the Shinra company. They had been responsible for the worst environmental damage the world had ever seen and, in one of their more unpopular moments, had levelled an entire slum by dropping a plate of Upper-Midgar on it. Their relaunch, however, would be imminent. A rebranding that would make the company stand for a thousand years. He stood up and crossed the room out into the corridor, finally pressing against the transparent viewing pane that overlooked the most guarded room in the Post-Crisis world.

“The calamity that fell from the sky.”

He watched as Jenovah consumed another victim – some nobody from the slums they had abducted – and then she banged on the glass begging for more.

“She needs to be let out,” said Hojo, who had noiselessly crept behind Rufus. “Her appetite and desire are too great for the scraps we can provide.”

“She is not to be removed from this chamber, is that understood?”

“Rufus-”

“I can return you to the grave as easily as I retrieved you from it.”

Hojo instinctively cackled at the threat, his criminal mind hard-wired to enjoy any malicious act. “Whatever you say, Mr President.”

Rufus had not broken eye contact with her. Through the soundproof walls he couldn't hear her, but his imagination was providing the shrieks from her imprisonment. “If she leaves these protected confines we would risk another reunion. I, for one, don't like the idea of every past member of SOLDIER showing up on our doorstep at this very second.”

“But the time will come?”

“It will be essential.”

#

He had ruined another life. Another woman. Cloud kicked the dirt at the bus stop, slouched in his seat, waiting for his ride. 

Every time he fell in love people got hurt. The first time had ended in death, and this time a broken marriage. He thought about Barrett, for a moment, and the mad trek he had undertaken to get Tifa back. The difference between them was that Barrett thought he deserved her, but Cloud, to himself, knew he couldn't give her anything but heartbreak. He pulled his coat tighter around his shoulders and exhaled into the cold night.

The bus finally puttered into view, grey smoke pouring out of the exhaust. Against the permanent black of the slums it almost looked like sunlight. The yellow text at the front of the bus read 'BASIC TRAINING'. Despite being fully trained Cloud would have to start from the beginning. He would have to climb up through the ranks.

He dropped some money in the lap of the driver and stalked his way to the back of the bus. It was full of fresh recruits - teenagers who had lied about their age, who had been inspired enough by those posters to put their lives on the line. Impressionable boys and girls who would be dead within a year, leaving nothing behind but a smoking crater and two grieving parents. 

Cloud took his seat. It still felt alien, to move about the world and not accommodate his usual unwieldy weapon. In his prime Cloud had wielded a sword larger than the length of his body and held it by his side at all times. It had been years since he had parted ways with it. Now, on a bus full of strangers, he found himself strangely wistful over the memory of that constant, sharp, companion.

A sergeant of SOLDIER boarded the bus. she was younger than Cloud. Shorter. More inexperienced. She was the unit leader who would take them from here to training, and be their commander for all that time. He hated her already.

Or at least he wanted to. For people like Cloud hating strangers is just a natural disposition. But this wasn't a stranger. As Cloud himself realised with a gasp as soon as he heard her voice:

"Alright you maggots!" she said, strutting with her hands on her hips down the aisle of the bus. "For the next six months you are mine!"

She hadn't noticed him yet. He was too far from view, hidden behind the seats in front. What are the odds, he thought to himself. He couldn't help but feel relief that this one tether to his previous happy life had presented herself.

Yuffie Kisaragi, sergeant of SOLIDER, ordered the driver to move out. The bus trundled on.

Cloud looked back out for one final glance at Sector 7, and gave a silent goodbye to the life he had hoped he could lead, and let himself be driven back towards a life in SOLDIER.


	4. SOLDIER

The bus rattled in to one of the smaller SOLDIER training grounds. It was placed on the border between the plains east of Midgar and the marshlands that lead to the mine. On the horizon, marked by its deadly shadow, you could see the spiralling shape of the Midgar Zolom.

“Killing that,” said Yuffie, over the PA system in the bus as they approached their destination. “Would mean instant graduation from SOLDIER.”

Cloud, considering this option, dismissed the notion after a few moments. Any thoughts of glory quickly replaced by the memory of another Zolom, from this exact spot, with its head impaled on a tree. The power of Sephiroth.

He shuddered at the name. Or was it Jenova? He found it hard to remember who was responsible for that violence. Both merged in his mind – the calamity that fell from the sky, and the son who almost brought the world to ruin by the power of his will.

The bus stopped. Yuffie stood to attention and ordered them all off. The teenagers he had ridden with scrabbled to get off the bus, forming an untidy line outside. Cloud took his time, and ambled after them.

As he descended the steps he took a good look at his old friend. She was small, with short brown hair and a bandanna hiding beneath her untidy fringe. The skirt and crop-top she wore in the old days was now replaced by a form-fitting SOLDIER uniform: shoulder pads, big boots, and a ridge-weave purple top. It was a uniform designed to be sexless. Despite its best attempts, it wasn't succeeding with Yuffie. The years since Cloud had last seen her had been kind to this combat-ready woman. Her legs were thick, with the smooth curve of feminine muscle. He couldn't stop his eyes wandering along their curvature as he stepped onto the ground.

“Nice of you to finally join us, you-” she paused as she finally saw his face. “Cloud!” 

Unable to restrain herself she ran and jumped at him, giving him a flying hug that knocked the wind out of his chest. They fell to the ground and Cloud wheezed for air.

“It's so good to see you! I mean-” she turned to face the recruits. “All of you, scum! Find your allocated tent and get ready for the evening inspection, a boot out of place will mean a boot up your keister! Dismissed!”

She pulled Cloud up by the hand.

“Long time no see,” Cloud said, dusting himself off.

“I can't believe it's you! It's been so long! Where have you been? Have you kept in contact with the others?”

Before he had a chance to pick which question to answer first, she lunged forward with her biggest and most feverish question:

“Have you spoken to Tifa?”

The look on his face made her instantly realise she had said something wrong.

“Or, you know,” she said, stalling for time, thinking of something else to say. “Have you spoken to... Red XIII?”

“No I haven't,” Cloud picked up his bag and slung it over his shoulder. “Which one's my tent?”

“Cloud I know I shouldn't ask, but you and Ti-”

“My tent?”

Yuffie pouted. She puffed up her chest and folded her arms. “Who do you think you're talking to, maggot?”

Cloud blinked slowly. Men like Cloud blink the kind of blink that can start world wars.

“Insubordination?” Yuffie began circling him, emphasising her words by jutting out her chin in her best attempt at a military manner. “Old friend or no, that behaviour cannot go unpunished. Drop your things off in your tent, prepare for evening inspection, and then tonight while the other maggots are asleep, you will be cleaning the side of the Officer's Station with a toothbrush. Do I make myself clear?”

“As crystal.”

Cloud, without a look back, marched to his tent.

#

She hadn't been lying about the toothbrush.

Cloud, grunting with every stroke, was on his knees at the back of the Officer's Station – the only brick building at the camp – and was cleaning it brick by brick.

Partially he felt the embarrassment of punishment, but mostly he felt good to be back with a military. There were rules here. Easy rules. Not like love – here, if you did something wrong, the punishment was straightforward and you knew when it ended.

He heard a rustling behind him.

“I'm not done yet Yuffie,” he said without turning around. “It's going to be a long night for the both of us.”

When only silence was in response, he turned. Standing before him, illuminated by the moon, was Tifa.

“What are you-”

He couldn't finish his sentence. The implication of her being there – he stopped his thoughts. It would be too easy to get ahead of himself. She stood before him, smiling, in full SOLDIER gear. He wanted to apologise to her, to tell her how he felt, to tell her he should never have come between her and Barrett.

But all he could think of was how good she looked in that uniform.

And then she started to take it off.

She popped the shoulder pads off and threw them into the distance, the metal glinting in the starlight. Then she pulled off the purple top revealing her beautiful, big, breasts. She wasn't wearing a bra and the cold, and her arousal, made her nipples stand to attention. It was like seeing a goddess in the flesh.

She stood topless and put a finger into her mouth – sucking it. Then, with a rip, she tore a hole in her uniform trousers around her crotch, and put her finger, dripping with her own spit, into her pussy.

Cloud, mouth agape, slouched towards her.

She instantly pushed him back, hard; his back against the wall of the station, just beneath a high window. Cloud unbuttoned his pants and his dick burst out – he was so hard it had hurt to keep it in. It throbbed hungrily at her.

She giggled and ran at him – leaping at the last second. She landed with her feet – still in SOLDIER boots – firm against the wall, pinning him to it, and her hands had a grip on the window ledge above, so she was entirely off the ground. She toyed with her prey, who was now almost suffocating in her breasts, and pushed herself against him. Cloud lapped her nipples, sucking them acutely, and he felt them get harder and more pert with every squeeze and lick.

Tifa, still holding herself aloft by the strength of her powerful arms, wiggled herself lower, and pushed Cloud's penis through the hole in the fabric of her uniform.

Her pussy was tight but wet. It was all he had ever dreamed of. But she was so much more energetic than he had dared to dream – in his mind Tifa would be powerful, strong, and deliberate in sex. In reality, she was feisty, fast-moving, and thirsty.

She lost her grip and fell to her feet on the ground with Cloud still inside her – the ultra-deep momentary penetration making them both cry out in pain and pleasure. She laughed into his shoulder as she pulled herself closer.

Cloud span them around and rammed her against the wall.

Her tits were so big it was like being in a car with deployed airbags – they bounced as he fucked her, her back firm against the wall, and his saliva dripped of her breasts as he madly lapped at them. He hoisted her up – still against the wall – so he could fuck her harder. She wrapped her legs around him, her boots digging into his back.

She stuck her tongue down his throat in a desperate kiss, and he gripped her so hard with his hands that she felt her ass hurt. 

“Never stop,” she said, panting into the air.

Something was different about her voice.

Before he had time to register what was new, the force of their fucking made something fall to the ground – it dropped out of Tifa's back pocket. Cloud's heart dropped as he instantly recognised what it was.

It was the Black Materia. The world ending power stone infused with the will of Sephiroth. The last time he had seen it he had been under enslaved under mind control.

He looked back. In his arms was no longer Tifa.

Yuffie, with Cloud's cock still in her dripping pussy, begged him to continue.

“I'll explain later – I'm so close. You have to finish me.”

Too close himself to pull out, Cloud pushed her harder against the wall and fucked her pussy raw. Her cheeks were red and she was cumming so hard she was finding it hard to breathe. 

Now it was Cloud's turn to ram his tongue down her throat – an angry forceful tonguing. She tried to keep up but, despite wanting to suck his tongue forever, had to spit him out to catch her breath.

Cloud finally set her down and pulled himself out of her, his semen dripping steadily from her satisfied pussy-lips.

#

Minutes had passed in silence. They now sat side by side, against the wall, the Black Materia between them.

“How did you get it?” Cloud asked.

Yuffie, now feeling the draft from the hole in her trousers, had her legs crossed. “Stealing materia is kind of my trade, y'know?”

“And why... why?”

He didn't need to put it into words.

“I always liked you Cloud,” she said, finally glancing sidewards to look him in the eye – it was the first eye contact they had made since he had been inside her. “Seeing you here, I couldn't help myself. I didn't think I had much chance based on your reaction when I mentioned her name.” She paused. “Tifa's name.”

Cloud winced.

“But I knew you'd respond to her,” she continued. “I couldn't help myself. Seeing you today awakened something inside me. The more I thought about you, the more I knew I needed you. So, I did the only think I knew that was guaranteed to make you fuck me.”

He looked at the materia. “You brainwashed me.”

She nodded, sadly.

“The last time I was brainwashed, enthralled by Sephiroth, I almost caused the destruction of the world.”

She knew she shouldn't say it, but the thought made her laugh too much. “Well this time,” she said, trying her best to keep a straight face. “You almost caused the destruction of my ass.”

Cloud was silent, but not scowling. For him this was the equivalent of a belly-laugh.

“It can't have been all bad, right?” she said.

He looked at her and her big, lustful eyes. “I've had worse evenings.”

He patted his hand down on her thigh and gripped her thick muscle.

“You know,” she said. “With this materia we have quite a lot of range. Every little fantasy you've ever had – I can make you think I'm anyone.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Curious?” she asked.

He nodded.

She stood up to attention, and gave a mock salute with her legs set wide apart, her vagina open to air.

“You better get in the habit of misbehaving, private.” she said, standing above him. “Because I'm going to punish that ass every night.”


	5. THE NIBELHEIM INCIDENT

Nibelheim was a town of dead memories. Families still lived there with missing rungs in their generations from where the fiery reunion had claimed lives only a few years before. The smell of mourning hung deep between the houses.

High on the hill looming over the town stood Shinra Mansion, as ghostly as a castle from a forgotten era. Sharp glass in the corners of broken windows made cutting noises against the wind, resembling the screaming of those lost when Sephiroth had last visited.

Tifa, standing at the gate into Nibelheim, was thinking twice about her decision to return here. Behind her she could hear the Highwind taking off. She could also hear the mad pilot cackling into the winds.

The ground was covered in snow at this time of year and she was wearing the only coat she had – it was too thin for this part of the world. She huddled her way into town, seeing the watertower at the centre, then walked into the inn.

Nibelheim had always been quiet, but this time was different: it wasn't the silence of a community experiencing terror, it was the absence of noise from abandoned homes.

There was a young couple snoozing on the counter at the inn. They started as Tifa closed the door behind her and were befuddled at the very idea of a paying customer. They took her gil and pointed her to her room. She took her single bag of luggage and collapsed on the bed.

If this is where I start again, she thought, at least there'll be room to think.

She slept the night in a peaceful sleep, broken only by the wind that sounded like screaming as it passed by the mansion up on the hill. For most people this would have incurred a restless night of fever dreams and panic, but after all that Tifa had been through on her adventures it may as well have been a lullaby.

A week passed, and it passed slowly. She made her way around the town to see who was still around. Apart from the couple who owned the inn there were only three families – all who wanted to keep to themselves, and didn't trust the friendship of so new a stranger. Tifa was also finding it difficult contending with the rules at the inn; they wouldn't serve alcohol after 10. For someone who used to run a bar, this made her evenings very difficult indeed. She began buying a stock of whiskey and rum bottles in the daytime so she could continue drinking when the rest of the town wound down.

She couldn't stay there, she realised. The city had changed her and she couldn't go back to this.

After a week she finally walked up to Shinra Mansion. She had been putting it off because of bad memories, but curiosity won out. She put on her new coat – a thick padded coat had been just about the only useful thing you could buy in Nibelheim – and had walked up to the mansion gates. They were closed, but not locked. She considered walking inside for a moment – she was still a dab hand at fighting so the monsters weren't a bother – but she thought the better of it. The thought of seeing that foyer, that safe, that secret passage to the basement, all of it, filled her with sadness at the friend she had lost because of Shinra.

She said a silent thank you to Aerith, her friend, the savior of the world who had summoned Holy, then turned from the mansion.

In front of her as soon as she turned around was a familiar face. Instinctively, she wound back her punching arm, and let fly at the suited man. 

He flew black and knocked the back of his head against a tree. There may have been blood pouring out but it was hard to tell with his red hair.

“That was very rude,” said Reno.

Tifa kept her fists up ready to fight. “What's a Turk doing snooping around the mansion?”

“Maybe I'm snooping around after you?”

Tifa didn't lower her fists.

“Yeah, OK, I'm here for the mansion,” Reno stood up and dusted himself off. “Easy money – someone just wants some documents. You want in? Can split the money 50/50, and as I recall you know your way around here pretty well.”

“I wouldn't work with you in a million years. Go home, Reno.”

“Oh come on, I'm not with Shinra anymore! This is the new Reno! I'm just trying to make a couple of gil. You must be bored out of your mind in this town, why don't you join me?”

Tifa looked back at the iron gate. “What documents?”

“Is that a yes?”

“No. What documents?”

Reno shrugged. “Beats me. Something-something-Jenova, Something-something-Sephiroth, not too surprising given the location.”

“Who's the contractor?”

“I can't give my sources away! I'm a businessman. With ethics. An ethical businessman. If I had business cards that's what I'd have on it.”

Tifa wasn't listening. He was droning on, talking about himself, but she was thinking about what could still be in that mansion. So many experiments had taken place there with Jenova cells – what if they had missed something before? What if something dangerous fell into the wrong hands? 

She pushed open the gate and marched into the mansion grounds.

“Woah, are you serious? You're joining me?” asked Reno, running alongside her.

“I'm burning it to the ground.”

The mansion was empty. Beyond all other description that one held the most importance for Tifa. It hadn't been lived in for years, but now even the monsters had gone. Now it was just a dust-trap. Cloth covered furniture was pushed against every wall, and creaking oak floorboards did their best to give you the impression of what a carnival thinks a haunted house is like. It took until after her eyes became accustomed to the darkness of the inside of the mansion to realise that Reno was still, somehow, talking.

“You can't burn it down right away though, right? You got to let Reno get his payday?”

He asked it with earnest desperation, and Tifa hated every cell in his body. “Please,” she said. “never refer to yourself in the third person again. And yes, we'll find your documents, but they're going into the fire too. I just need to know what they are first – so we know what we're up against.”

“We?” said Reno with a wink.

Tifa scowled; “You were certainly not a part of that we.”

“I always liked you Tifa,” said Reno, as she walked further into the mansion. She ignored him as he continued to rabbit on. She was never a fan of talkers. Cloud, Barrett – men who only spoke when they needed to, that's what she respected. She preferred men who never spoke at all as a matter of fact. When men opened their mouths it often only ruined what had been a perfectly decent face.

She went upstairs and to the right, remembering the layout of the building. She walked through a door into the bedroom and saw the curved stone wall with a draft coming from it, signalling the secret passage to the basement.

She took a breath to calm her nerves, then reached to open it.

“Woah woah, what's the rush, T?” said Reno, moving in front of her and grabbing her by the shoulders.

Whether she reacted because he had grabbed her, or because he had the nerve to call her “T”, we'll never know. However, Tifa reacted to this situation by firmly punching Reno on the chin, and the back of his head for a second time that day hit hard against the wall behind him.

“OK! OK! I get it, that was a bad move.” He rubbed the back of his head, and somehow still had the confidence to wink at her. “I was just thinking, well, you know what room we're in right?”

She shook her head. He nodded over her shoulder, and she turned back to see a double bed.

“Christ almighty,” she said rubbing her forehead with her hand.

“Whenever I saw you I thought to myself – 'Reno, I thought, Reno that Cloud is a lucky dude. Look at her!' and then I run into you all the way out here and all on your own. The dream team must be over, is what I'm assuming. And I know that you must have been looking at me the same way before!”

Tifa rolled her eyes to let him know she certainly had not been looking at him in the same way before.

“Are you kidding?” he continued, exasperated. “You never even thought about it? I'm Reno! Look at me; twinkle in my eye, suave, cute as a button, and-” here he lifted up his white shirt. “- rocking abs. What do you say now?”

Her honest reaction was that, after seeing the firm battle-torn abs of Cloud only recently, Reno was only a disappointment. But she politely kept this thought restrained to a simple sigh, and she asked Reno to stop.

“OK! OK! So maybe I'm not quite the ticket for you, but I'm not bad, right? Must be awful lonely living up in Nibelheim with no menfolk around. I'm not asking to be your number one guy, but we are two hot blooded adults on an adventure in a ghost house, and it seems only fitting that we make the most of the situation.”

Like a schoolteacher being talked into wheeling in the television on the last day of term, Tifa thought to hell with it, and let herself be whittled down to this compromise.

“If we do this,” she said, sternly. “You're helping with this fire.”

His eyes lit up.

Without waiting for another word – lest she changed her mind – Reno pushed her back onto the bed, and peeled her out of her thick coat. He reacted like most men do when they saw her beasts up close, and he played with them like a dog. Tifa was already regretting the decision. This wasn't a real man. 

He whipped his suit jacket off and unbuttoned his shirt. He was thin and wiry, with only light muscle definition. Tifa slid her top off but decided to keep her bra on as soon as she felt the chill of the air. Reno went in for a kiss.

She put a hand on his chest.

“None of that. Get to work.”

She pointed south and Reno, again like a panting dog, tore at her skirt and pulled it down to her ankles. He took a big comical sniff of her panties, as if he were a prisoner smelling the fresh air, then dived in.

She was shocked - he knew what he was doing. She felt his tongue curl around her clit, sucking it firmly. Meanwhile he was two fingers deep into her pussy – curling the tips back to her g-spot. She felt her hands grip the sheets reflexively, and she was shaking with delight. Reno could feel her joy, and slipped in a third finger, and was toying with her anus with his other hand – delicately snaking around the hole with his fingertips. Tifa arched her back in pleasure, trying to hold herself back from coming too soon, to drag out the thrills.

Reno stood up to take off his trousers and briefs, he kept his socks on. Tifa was disappointed at the faux pas with the socks, then peered curiously at his waist. It was a pretty penis, she had to give him that. It wasn't winning any contests for girth, but she had seen enough monsters over the years to appreciate a well maintained, suckable, cock.

He placed a hand on each of her knees, like a child at the seat of a toy car, and entered her. He then draped forward and fucked her in the missionary position, still obsessively batting her tits around like it was his first time or something. She waited for it to get good. She wanted it to get good. It had started off so promising, that was some seriously talented head, but this – it was like he had the width of a matchstick down there, the way he was using it. Men know how to use their dicks, and this – she concluded – was a boy making pretend.

“This can't be working for you?” she said, cutting the rhythm of the situation.

Reno was wide eyed and scared. “Uh,” he managed to get out, then; “yes?”

“You need to fuck me like you're a man, or you need to stop fucking me.”

“You need to appreciate how lucky you are that Reno is fucking you.”

Whether she reacted because he had insulted her, or because he had the nerve to again refer to himself in the third person, we'll never know. However, Tifa reacted to this situation by punching Reno straight in the chest, and he flew from the bed – his dick dripping out of her vagina – and he landed against the stone wall.

He rubbed his head, certain that this day had brought him nothing but brain damage, then went to stand up. A look from Tifa made him reconsider and he stayed sat where he was. He looked sad and rejected. His cock was still hard, throbbing, and hungry – and after a moment his libido regained control of his actions. He grinned as, staying where he was, he gripped his dick and started pumping it while staring at Tifa.

She allowed it. She let him take her in like a goddess. She was sat at the foot of the bed, legs wide apart, baring her pussy to him. He was gawking straight down the middle, fascinated by the wet lips, as droplets of her pussy juicy dripped to her thigh, pooling into a patch on the bed beneath. She allowed him to finish himself, but she didn't feel the need to masturbate herself.

When he came, the semen crashed up his body, and a little reached his chin. He leant back against the wall in relief. “Hey Tifa,” he said, gesturing to the trail of his own juices. “how about you clean this off for me?”

She replied by throwing his shirt and trousers at him. “We have actual work to do,” she said.


End file.
